


Crestfallen

by sciencefictioness



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe- Supernatural Creatures, Bestiality, Blood, Come On Now Guys, Consentacles, Courtship, Eren's Green Mermaid Cock, Human Sacrifice, It's Prehensile, M/M, Octo Jean, Smut, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates, Swearing, Tentacles, Threesome - M/M/M, Violence, What Are A Few Tentacles Between Friends, You're Welcome, but not really, human levi, mermaid eren
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-02
Updated: 2016-09-02
Packaged: 2018-08-12 13:13:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,970
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7936054
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sciencefictioness/pseuds/sciencefictioness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The woods are split in two by the cliffs that break through the land, humans living high above while other, more savage creatures living below.  The only thing that connects their worlds is a river, and the waterfall that runs between them.  That and the marks that sometimes appear on a human’s throat, like a tattoo of gills or scales or feathers.  When they show up the person is brought to the top of the falls and offered up in sacrifice.</p><p>Except the supernatural beings below don’t want sacrifices.  They just want their mates, and for the humans to stop tossing them off the falls to their deaths.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crestfallen

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the SNK Minibang, with art by erenfanclub, levichiieru, and kiokushitaka. I will update this with links to the artwork as soon as it is posted.  
> Now with art by levichiieru, which you can find [ here.](http://levichiieru.tumblr.com/post/149851117250/this-fanart-is-for-the-fanfic-crestfallen-by-the)  
> Also with art by erenfanclub, which you can find [ here.](http://erenfanclub.tumblr.com/post/149859714748/here-is-my-art-for-crestfallen)
> 
> I want to thank my artists for all the hard work they put in. I definitely didn't make this easy for you. 'Oh someone's gonna draw this? Make the character designs complex as fuck. That's nice.'
> 
> I'm sorry I didn't think. But you guys did great.

It wasn’t as though there was a specific day set for the village to hold a crestfall.  It didn’t coincide with the full moon, or the solstice, or any particular season of the year.  It wasn’t something they did to celebrate the harvest, or the changing of the seasons.  Wasn’t something  _ celebratory  _ at all, in fact.  The marks did not appear with any sort of regularity.  Sometimes months and months passed without anyone being dragged to the falls from a nearby settlement, or one of their own waking up to that telltale heat on the skin of their throats.

 

Other times there were two or three in a span of weeks.  No one had quite figured out a method to the madness, even after all these centuries.  There was also no indication of who would bear the marks, no way to predict which villagers would end up at the top of the falls.

 

Tied by their wrists, one stretching towards each of the rivers’ banks.  Nothing under their feet but open air and an impossibly blue pool much too distant to be of any comfort, rough scaffolding holding them just out of the water.  For a while, anyway.  Until either the wood or ropes gave way and they fell, or the creatures below climbed up the falls to claim them.

 

Levi couldn’t really decide which was worse.  At least if someone fell they were guaranteed a quick death, the drop too far to be anything but fatal.  Smashed to pieces on the rocks, necks broken by the impact when they hit the water, drowned in the furious maelstrom at the foot of the falls.  If they didn’t fall quickly enough, though, they were _ taken. _

 

Taken by beings that were never quite human, feathered or scaled or furred in places, always pointing their too-bright eyes at everyone nearby as though the villagers themselves were the real monsters.  

 

Watching his own friends taken, people he cared about falling to be broken apart on the cruel stones below, Levi couldn’t help but think that the creatures might be right.

 

They didn’t know when it would happen, or who it would happen to, so when Levi woke up with the skin of his throat on fire on both sides, not one but two marks, he was…  Surprised was the word that came to mind, what he should have been feeling, but that wasn’t totally accurate.  

 

He’d expected fear, or horror, but that wasn’t it, either.  Levi was about to be killed, either by a deadly fall or under the teeth and claws of beasts, and all he could manage to feel was some kind of bizarre relief.

 

_ Finally,  _ something in him breathed, and Levi wondered if he was losing his mind.

 

Then everything was sharp focus and determination, because even if he’d never heard of anyone escaping the crestfall, he was certainly going to try.  On principle, if nothing else.  Levi didn’t bother attempting to cover up the marks that had appeared on both sides of his neck, one that looked like a tattoo of scales, the other image twisting serpentine.  Like snakes, but there were no heads, no eyes, no tapering tails.  There were also little circles of varying size dotting the undersides.  

 

It was taboo to cover up the skin where a mark could hide, even during the frigid days of winter, and  he’d be more noticeable that way.

 

So he got dressed, shouldered his bow and his pack, and ran.  But every step away from the river felt wrong, and his feet kept wanting to take him back, to carry him to the banks, to ease him into the waters.

 

Stand as close to the crest as he dared, and  _ wait... _

 

Still, he made it to edge of the forest before taking an arrow in one of his thighs.  It was inevitable, especially considering he wore two marks, chosen doubly for sacrifice to appease the beasts at their door.   There was a sharp sting, a rush of fluid, and the world twisted sideways.  His legs fell out from beneath him, and then there was nothing else he could do but collapse.   _ I could fight, _ some distant part of him whispered, but even the idea was repugnant.  It seemed like betrayal.  Like abandonment, though Levi wasn’t sure why.

 

A half dozen of the village’s warriors had to knock his uncle out completely, another handful subduing Farlan and Isabel.  They were bloody and screaming by the time Levi was strung out across the falls, nothing but a thin strip of leather to conceal his nudity, gore leaking steadily from the wound in his thigh.  It was bleeding heavily enough that Levi thought he might not have to worry about falling, or monsters.

 

They seemed to have nicked his artery with that arrow, and Levi didn’t know if he’d be able to hold onto consciousness.  The water was a deluge at his back, and even if he wasn’t quite in the river’s flow, the scaffolding keeping the ropes in place, Levi was soaked through.  A steady mist made it hard to see, and the sound of his friends falling to pieces was just loud enough to hear over the roar of the waters.  

 

Maybe it was the blood loss, but Levi was oddly euphoric dangling above the valley below, feet kicking aimlessly forward and back.  Like a child in a chair that was too tall for them, toes flitting through the air.  He wasn’t really afraid, but there was anticipation of a different kind swirling in his guts.

 

Then he looked down for the first time, something he’d deliberately been avoiding, and he saw them.  Climbing the sharp rocks of the falls, their bodies only intermittently visible through the cascading waters.  Two figures, ascending faster than should be possible, weaving back and forth to seek out handholds.  They were obscured by the river flowing around them, sometimes vanishing entirely only to reappear closer, but when they looked up at him he could see their eyes shining clearly.

 

Bright gold, and brilliant green, both of them feral with something akin to desperation etched into their features.  After being raised to fear creatures like them his whole life, Levi’s first thought was that they must be hungry.  But the higher they climbed, the more clear their expressions became, they didn’t really look like they were after a meal.

 

They looked afraid.  Worried, and resolved, and even with the scaffold that supported him groaning under the strain of the river’s flow, and the ropes going loose around his wrists, Levi suddenly felt safe.  

 

_ They’ll save me, _ he thought absurdly, just before the scaffolding on his right gave way and Levi sank backwards into the falls, water pouring relentlessly over his face.  There was no air to breathe, and he kicked his feet violently forward, trying to rock himself briefly out of the water to get a lungful of air.  It wasn’t working, and the lack of oxygen coupled with the blood trickling steadily out of his thigh was starting to make Levi’s world go hazy and blurred.

 

He was going to die after all, bled out and drowned by his own people, when he was so close to-

 

So close to what?

 

_ Completion,  _ his mind supplied.   _ So close to being whole.   _

 

Levi blinked his eyes shut, coughed and sputtered, lungs trying futilely to suck in air that wasn’t there.  Dizziness overwhelmed him, and his hands fisted open and closed, seeking something to grab onto that might hold him steady, but there was nothing but water that was colder by the second.  Filling up his lungs, turning him to ice.  The ropes on his left wrist were painfully tight, bearing all of his weight now that the other side had fallen.

 

Then there were arms around him, tugging him not forwards out of the flow but backwards underneath it, into the dark pocket of wet air between the rocks and the waterfall.  An arm underneath his shoulders, and around his waist, and gripping his thighs, and even through the murk of almost-unconsciousness, Levi knew that was too many arms.  And those coiled around his legs were slick and clinging, like snakes but wetter, clutching at the soft skin on the inside of his thighs almost painfully tight.

 

He hacked up a few mouthfuls of bitter river water, finally managing a rough, shuddering breath, and Levi heard a pair of relieved sighs.  He forced his eyes open, and the first thing he was was a pair of golden eyes watching him with wonder.  Like he was some sort of miracle made flesh, stare darting from his throat to his face, back and forth.  Enraptured.  When his gaze drifted down Levi’s own eyes went wide, because it wasn’t a snake wrapped around his legs, and he laughed, sharp and dark.

 

“Fucking tentacles.”  

 

The dark brows above those gold eyes furrowed in confusion, and Levi heard a laugh from behind him just as the ropes binding his wrists fell loose.  The pull on his left was gone, and gentle fingers massaged at the rope burn wrapping around the skin there like a bracelet.  Levi craned his head back, and suddenly there was someone pressed into him from both sides, warm and strong.  The being at his back was dangling from one arm, fingers sunk into the rocks desperately, the muscles there trembling under the strain of holding his own weight aloft one handed.  But he seemed to need his other hand, which was covered in dark green scales and tipped with vicious claws, to comb through Levi’s hair.  To stroke his cheek, to trace his lips.  Careful of the sharp tips of his fingers, gentle, so gentle.

 

The other creature clinging to Levi seemed content to let his hands flex over the muscles of Levi’s shoulders, nosing into his throat, clutching at his skin.  The water from the falls poured down in front of them, and the light filtered through in muted shades of blue, and Levi’s breathing was too loud, and it was… perfect.  A honeyed voice spoke, but which beast it came from, Levi wasn’t sure.

 

“You’re safe now.  We’ve got you.”

 

Hundreds of feet above the foot of the falls, barely able to keep himself awake, cold and wet and bleeding, but Levi believed them.  He curled up into the gold-eyed boy’s chest, and let out a sigh, and let himself relax against his slick skin, eyes falling shut.  Their words were far away, yet urgent, but Levi couldn’t find voice to answer them.

 

“I smell blood.”

 

“...e’s hurt!”

 

“...arrow in his thigh, those fuckin…”

 

“...st go, dive, he’s bleeding out, we need to get…”

 

Then Levi’s guts were in his throat, his heart stuttering wild, because he was falling, falling, falling.  

 

They hit the water hard with the body holding him absorbing the worst of the impact, and everything was black, but despite being underwater there were soft voices whispering in his ear. Soothing promises made in a language he’d never heard before, and even with an ache in his lungs and fire in his thigh, Levi was home.

 

…………………………

  
  


Levi had the distinct sensation of being watched, even before he opened his eyes.  Everything hurt, but mostly his lungs felt like they were full of water, not to mention the vicious stinging of his left thigh.  When he pried his lids apart all Levi could see was vague dimness, a few shafts of light breaking through, and it took a few moments of listening to the sound of rushing water to realize he was in a cavern of some sort.  Tucked behind the falls, probably, and Levi tried to sit up only to realize what a legitimately awful idea it was.  Pain lanced through his leg, head throbbing violently, and he had to fight down nausea as he lay back against the furs with a groan.

 

_ Furs? _

 

He turned his head to the side, looking at the makeshift pallet he was spread out on in confusion, pawing at the soft pelts.  A few blind pats of his hand, and Levi found he was covered in furs as well, all the way up to his chest.  Tucked in like a child, and it had been a long time since Levi had felt… protected.

 

Then he remembered he was at the bottom of the falls, wounded and at the mercy of creatures who might devour him, and those warm feelings of safety ebbed back to leave unease in their wake.

 

The sound of rocks skittering over rough ground and water splashing had Levi instantly alert, and he fought through the sickness and ache and pulled himself upright.  He listed back and forth slightly even seated as he was, and the two figures approaching him from one side looked like four for a moment.  The double vision cleared after a few blinks.

 

Levi sort of wished it hadn’t.

 

Because now he was staring at two… beings, only a few feet away, both of whom were looking at him with worried expressions.  Levi might not be well versed in supernaturals, but even a child from his village would be able to recognize what these two were.   Both were mostly human down to their waists, and then things got… interesting.  

 

One was a mer of some sort, wild brown hair and bright green irises with a tail covered in scales the exact same shade as his eyes.  He had gills on each side of his throat, but the pair of horizontal slits was barely visible beneath the black wash of his marks.   One of the tattoo-like designs matched one of Levis, twisting snakelike across the mer’s neck.  The other side boasted a bow and arrow instead of the scales Levi wore on his skin.  His ears looked more like fins, dark green as all the inhuman parts of him were, webbed and pointed in more than one place.  Levi had seen his hands before, but they drew his eyes again, scaled and clawed and webbed between his fingers.  There were also two long fins running from his wrist to his elbow, fanning out in a way that should have been unsettling but somehow was not.  They looked graceful instead, and Levi wanted to touch them, wanted to see how they felt under his fingers.

  
  


The mer was tan, and muscled, and his tail was enormously long.  Much longer than his legs would have been, had he been fully human.  It was sprawled out next to him with the forked tip hanging over the rocks and moving slowly back and forth through the water.  There was a dark vertical slit in the scales below his hips, where his thighs might have met if his biology was different, looking wetter than the rest of him somehow.  Levi didn’t want to think about what it might be, what it  _ obviously  _ was, and he let his gaze flit over to the second creature.

 

The other was blond, hair cut shorter, the underside starkly darker than the top.  His eyes shone golden in the dim light of the cavern, his torso longer and leaner than his companion’s but no less defined.  He had gills just like the mer, and was marked with the same bow and arrow that Levi lacked, yet wore a scale mark identical to the one Levi had.  

 

Instead of a tail, there were tentacles sprawling out from his hips, brilliant purple on top, richer shades underneath, the edges outlines in startling brightness.  Little suckers dotted the bottom of the tentacles, and a closer inspection revealed he also had them along the underside of his forearms.  An octo, then, though they weren’t supposed to come so close to the falls.  They were saltwater from the tales Levi had heard, not freshwater, and he wasn’t sure how this one was living in the river that flowed nearby.

 

It wasn’t exactly hard to figure out what his marks represented, now.  Scales for the mer, tentacles for the octo.  Why he had them was another question entirely.  Why they had a mark for one another, as well as a bow and arrow, was equally baffling.

 

Levi knew he should be afraid, but somehow their presence was comforting instead of frightening.  The marks on his throat heated up, and words were falling from his mouth, sounding raspy and broken.

 

“So these marks tell you guys who gets to eat me, or what?”  The blond looked horrified, while the mer just smiled, amused, and answered.

 

“We aren’t going to eat you.  Your tribes have the crestfall all wrong now.  It’s not supposed to be a sacrifice.  It’s supposed to join our peoples together, not tear them apart as it does.”  Levi scowled, wishing he could back further away from them as they edged nearer, but possessing neither the motivation nor the ability to do so.

 

“Tying me to the falls isn’t the best way to bring people together.  Instills a bit of hostility, actually.”  The blond glared, crossing his arms over his chest with a huff before speaking.

 

“That’s not our fault!  They aren’t supposed to tie the marked to the falls.  You’re supposed to wait at the top when you are ready to be claimed.  You’re supposed to  _ choose,  _ not be forced into it.”  

 

The mer was almost close enough to touch Levi, and he seemed as though he was aching to do so, fingers flexing against the rocks.  Levi eyed him warily, but did not move away.

 

Could not.  

 

Didn’t want to, and that was frightening all on its own.

 

“Claimed by who?  For what?”  The mer reached out then, trailing slick, clawed fingers over Levi’s knuckles where they supported him on the furs he rested on.  

 

“Claimed by your mates.  The marks, they’re mating marks.  They tell us who our soulmate is.  Or soulmates, sometimes.”

 

Soulmates.

 

Levi was suddenly dizzy, the black swirls on his throat on fire now, blinking stupidly at the creatures before him.  The blond edged forward, head cocked to the side.

 

“What’s your name?  I’m Jean.  This is Eren.  What do we call you?”  Levi’s mouth was dry, and his arms began to shake with exertion, but he gasped the word out anyway.

 

“Levi.  Name’s Levi.”

 

_ “Levi.” _

 

They said it in unison, and it was low and reverent.  They spoke his name like a prayer, and it was the last thing he heard before he lay down in his furs and closed his eyes.  He’d fallen from the top of world down into someplace he didn’t understand, and now otherworldly beings were claiming to be his soulmates.  He’d been shot with arrows, and half frozen, and looked at like some sort of gift from the gods.

 

Levi had never felt so overwhelmed in his entire life, and he was through fighting the heavy pull of exhaustion.

 

Sleep.

 

Levi needed sleep.

 

………………

  
  


When Levi woke up again, it was to the sounds of a crackling fire and smell of meat cooking.  He rolled restlessly back and forth in his furs before opening his eyes, the sharp pain in his thigh faded to a dull throbbing.  The light from the flames was too bright, far enough away that he wouldn’t roll into the blaze but close enough that he could feel the heat, and Levi blinked at it through a squint until his eyes adjusted.

 

Until a pair of faces thrust themselves into his line of vision, too close, a scaly green palm splayed out over his forehead.  Levi wanted to recoil but found himself pressing into the cool touch instead as Eren began firing off questions.

 

“How do you feel?  How is your leg?”  Jean interrupted, one tentacle slipping up to tug down Levi’s furs, probably to look at his thigh.  

 

“Are you hungry?  We cooked you some fish.  There’s clean water, too, and Eren treated your wound but we need to look at it again, probably.”  

 

Levi clutched the furs to his waist instinctively at first, before letting Jean tug them away.  Every little movement sent fresh waves of heat through his leg, and he wasn’t sure what he expected to see when he looked down, but he really shouldn’t have been surprised.

 

Seaweed.  There was… seaweed, or at least something wet and green and plant like, wrapped around his wound.  It seemed unsanitary somehow, but considering how much it had ached before, there was definitely some kind of improvement.  The very idea of putting up a struggle was tiring, and Levi finally just sighed and let his muscles fall loose. 

 

Eren brought a stone cup full of water to Levi’s lips and urged him to drink.  When Levi tried to take it for himself Eren shook his head, pressing to stone insistently against Levi’s mouth until he relented.  It was gloriously cold, and tasted better than anything Levi ever remembered drinking.  He wondered just how dehydrated he was, and emptied to cup several times over before his thirst even started to be quenched.

 

As Eren tried to get Levi to continue drinking, Jean took care of his wound with careful hands.  He unwrapped it, pouring water over it to clean away the little bits of green that clung to Levi’s leg.  Levi hissed as Jean scrubbed the swollen flesh, putting some sort salve on before covering it with a fresh layer of green wrapping.

 

He found the pain was less troubling than the soothing noises Jean and Eren started making when he showed any signs of discomfort.  They shushed him, and crooned soft praises to him, Eren stroking clawed fingers through his hair.   _ Almost done, you’re doing so well, _ as though he’d done anything at all besides hiss and wince and lie there.  It was unsettling, the way they fussed over him, fretting over every little twitch and cringe.

 

Not quite as unsettling as how much he seemed to like it.  Something in Levi loosened under their quiet words and gentle prodding.  He relaxed as Jean tucked dry furs around him, dazed under Eren’s trailing fingers, calm and drowsy when he should be terrified.

 

Then Jean and Eren took turns handfeeding Levi pieces of fish, refusing to let him feed himself even after he insisted he was perfectly capable of doing so.  For reasons Levi couldn’t quite fathom he allowed them to continue, opening his mouth to accept tiny morsels of overcooked meat.  His lips brushed their fingertips from time to time, and he pretended he didn’t notice them shivering.  There were also berries, and a few oysters, and Levi took them gingerly from inhuman fingers, everything in him going quiet and satiated.  He didn’t know where their hands had been, Eren had probably skinned those fish with his claws, and Levi should be disgusted, but he wasn’t.

 

Eren and Jean looked almost drugged, eyes half lidded, pupils blown wide and dark.  They watched him eat with something like hunger of their own, and Levi was sure it wasn’t for the fish he was eating.  They seemed drunk with satisfaction each time he took a mouthful of water from them, or accepted a bit of food.  Eren kept toying with his hair, and Levi let him without protest, though he still didn’t know why.  Jean piled up more furs behind Levi for him to lean against, and when he settled into them the octo sighed in contentment.  Levi threw a glance his way, brows furrowed, speaking the first thing that came to mind.  Anything to break the comfortable, soft quiet of the moment.

 

“I thought octos were from the sea.”  Jean blinked through his daze, some semblance of clarity coming back, and then looked away.

 

“We are.  Usually.  I mean, I am...”  Levi couldn’t help but think he’d… offended him somehow, or made him self conscious.   Eren spoke up, voice low.

 

“Jean has an issue with the saltwater.  He can’t go very far past the mixing point.  Where the saltwater meets the fresh.  Something with his gills is… off.  He almost died in the ocean once he reached maturity before making his way here through the underwater caves that lead to the sea.”  There were shadows in Jean’s features now, and Levi hated himself for putting them there, especially considering how blissful he’d been before.

 

He was worried about hurting an octo’s _ feelings,  _ and Levi didn’t know who he was anymore, only that the urge to apologize was overwhelming.

 

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

 

“It’s fine.  It’s not a big deal.  Besides, if I hadn’t come to freshwater, I’d never have gotten my marks.  Never have found Eren.  I don’t miss the ocean.”

 

Which was a lie, even Levi could tell, but he didn’t contradict him.  Just laid a hand over Jean’s own, and watched with amusement as a flush crept up in his cheeks.  

 

Jean’s tentacles flashed brightly, pink rings lighting them up in pulses before they faded away.  Eren giggled at the sight, and Jean threw a halfhearted punch at him, glaring.  _  Oh. _

 

Octos blushed with their whole bodies, and fuck if that wasn’t cute somehow.

 

They tried to force more food on him, but Levi refused, stuffed so full he felt like he might burst.  The next few hours were a blur of conversation, and other than answering their rapid fire questions, Levi couldn’t get a word in edgewise.   Besides prying the story of how they’d met out of them, anyway.  They asked about his family, his village, and Levi waited for the homesickness that was surely to come.

 

Because he wanted to go back, didn’t he?  His friends were there, his home, his entire life.  

 

It didn’t really seem pressing in that moment, though, the homeland he’d left behind at the top of the falls.  Kenny, Isabel, and Farlan were all he had left anyway.

 

And no one came back from the crestfall.  Maybe this was why.

 

Jean’s voice was something he could relax into, and Eren’s fingers were soft in his hair in spite of the claws.  Levi’s throat hurt from talking by the time he drifted off, but he’d take the pain any day for the look in those too bright eyes that were fixed on him.

 

Like every word was precious, and if he could have, he would have talked forever.

 

…………………..

 

It took a week or so before Levi’s leg was anything close to healed, and another before Eren and Jean were very happy about letting him get around on his own.  During those days he was coddled to the point of madness.  There was always fresh fish waiting for him to eat, and Jean kept a steady supply of oysters coming.  On a couple of occasions there were rabbits, skinned and roasting over the fire.  Levi wasn’t sure how two mostly aquatic creatures managed to snare them, but he didn’t press the question.  

 

They helped him limp out from behind the falls to relieve himself, and held him steady under the more gentle parts of the the flow when he insisted on washing off.  Eren stayed in the water, reaching up to keep him on his feet, while Jean slithered from the pool to stand on his tentacles next to Levi.  It didn’t bother him as much as it should, the sight of Jean walking on his purple appendages.  After the first few times he saw Jean moving out of the water, there was something fluid about it.  Almost graceful. 

 

When he undressed in order to bathe they both flushed and looked away, pink rings dancing over Jean’s tentacles, and Levi was hard pressed not to laugh.

 

It was fucking adorable, and he bit his lip and hurried through the motions of rinsing clean, hoping they wouldn’t notice his amusement.

 

They talked incessantly, and sometimes Levi wanted to tell them to be quiet, but couldn’t find it in himself to contain their endless curiosity.  They spoke about almost everything imaginable, asking Levi questions about the people at the top of the falls that he couldn’t always answer.  They told him about the myriad different creatures that lived around them, sirens and centaurs and faunus and more.  

 

Levi hadn’t seen anyone besides Jean and Eren since he’d fallen down into this world, and when he mentioned that fact, they shrugged in unison, nonplussed.

 

_ ‘No one would dream of disturbing us right now,’  _ as though that was all the answer Levi needed.

 

Other than the first conversation they had with Levi, no one mentioned soulmates again.  No talk of destiny, no whispers of claiming.  Eren liked to thread his fingers through Levi’s hair, and Jean often coiled a tentacle absently around Levi’s thigh or wrist or ankle, though he seemed entirely unaware of it.  Like a child clinging for comfort, and Levi often fell asleep with cool hands tracing his features and wet skin clutching at his legs.

 

Soon it was strange for Levi to lay down without one of them touching him.  He’d look around, tossing and turning in discomfort, and he never said a word, but it was never long before someone crept to his side.  Heaved themselves out of the water to lay next to him, like it was the most natural thing in the world.

 

Eren stared at Levi as though he wanted to devour him, and Jean reached out time and time again like he wanted to touch, but always pulled his hands back.  They never tried to kiss him, even if they both watched his mouth and licked their lips like they were desperate for a taste.

 

After the first few days, when Levi’s fever went down and there was no longer the immediate threat of infection, little trinkets began to arrive.  Sometimes they were waiting when he woke up, laid out on a fur like an offering.  Other times Eren or Jean burst from the water, smiling wide and swimming to water’s edge near Levi, hands held out triumphantly with some ‘treasure’ cupped carefully within them.

 

There were lots of shimmering iridescent stones of varying color.  Some of them perfectly smooth and round, other jagged and sharp, but all undoubtedly pretty.  Eren tended to be the one bringing these, grinning as though he’d brought Levi some rare and priceless gemstone instead of a river rock.  Jean showed up with sand dollars.  The tiniest pearls Levi had ever seen.  Seashells in all different shades, and shapes, and sizes.  A few chunks of bright red coral.

 

Each time he accepted one of their gifts Jean and Eren preened, expressions going pleased and proud, faces broken open with their smiles.  It seemed to some sort of a contest for them, and when they thought he wasn’t listening, wasn’t watching, they bickered about which trinkets Levi liked best.

 

_ ‘He likes mine better.’ _

 

_ ‘Why would he, all you bring him is rocks.’ _

 

_ ‘Shut up Jean.  I didn’t know pearls could even be that small.  Aren’t sand dollars animal bones, technically?  You’re bringing him corpses.’ _

 

_ ‘Eren, I swear to fuck-’ _

 

Bickering wasn’t all they did when they thought Levi was sleeping.  More than once he’d opened his eyes and found Eren and Jean in the water, or sprawled out on the rocks nearby.  Tangled up in one another, mouths buried together, quiet noises of pleasure slipping out between them.  They kissed, and sucked at each other’s throats, and nipped and hissed and licked.  Eren would sink his fingers into Jean’s hair, and Jean’s tentacles were everywhere.  Around Eren’s back, and holding tight to his tail.  In his mouth sometimes, to quiet Eren’s mewling cries.

 

Around the green, tapering cock that often protruded from the wet slit below Eren’s hips.   Dipping into the slit itself, deeper than should be possible, and Levi flushed hot at the thought of what would happen if he delved his own fingers into that slickness.

 

At the thought of Jean’s tentacles splitting him open.  Of sinking down onto Eren’s shining length, Jean’s appendage still wrapped around it, both of them filling him up at once.

 

Levi didn’t understand why they wanted anything to do with him.  Not considering the way they looked at each other in those moments.  Eren lost in the warmth of Jean’s breath, shivering under the weight of ecstasy.  Jean mindless, mouthing needily at Eren’s skin, nails digging into his back.  They seemed…

 

Whole.  Content.

 

Definitely not in need of a whining, land-bound human with a freshly healed arrow wound and a healthy dose of sarcasm.

 

Yet as the weeks went by, every day his pile of shimmering rocks and ornate shells and tiny little pearls grew larger.  Sometimes he caught himself sinking his fingers into them, feeling the smooth stones, watching the pearls roll back and forth in the oysters they’d been carefully laid inside.  Anytime Jean or Eren saw him toying with the offerings they brought, their cheeks went pink and they looked away.

 

Smiling.  Fuck’s sake, they  _ never  _ stopped smiling at him, even when he was sniping and complaining.  

 

Levi fell asleep in his furs with Eren’s hand in his hair.  Jean’s tentacle around his thigh.  Their breathing soft and somnolent, steady and even and familiar.

 

Wondered why they bothered with him at all.

 

He certainly didn’t feel worth it.

 

……………………

 

Levi woke up next to a huge chunk of quartz beside his pile of stones, and the loud sounds of splashing and swearing.  He sat up in a rush, eyes seeking out the noise, and there was Eren.

 

Holding a pale, gasping Jean up in the water, and Eren kept lifting up handfuls of the cool fluid to pour over Jean’s red, inflamed gills, growling out angry words.

 

“...so fucking stupid, you know better than this.  Besides it was ‘just a fucking rock’, what’s the matter with you.”

 

Jean seemed incapable of speech, chest heaving violently as Eren continued bathing his gills in fresh water.  Finally he just eased Jean deeper into the pool until his gills were submerged.  They looked almost infected, skin swollen and bright behind his mate marks.  Eren rubbed his fingers over them, trying to coax them open when they wanted to seal themselves closed.  Levi was next to them before he’d realized he’d moved at all, brows furrowed, and he reached out and cupped Jean’s cheek with one hand.

 

“What happened to him?”  Jean blinked slowly and opened his mouth, but the only thing that came out was a pained groan.  Eren was more than happy to speak for him, his tone dark and furious.

 

“I found a piece of quartz, and Jean had to outdo me, so he went too far past the mixing point and almost killed himself trying to find some stupid fucking courting gift.”

 

Jean just smiled wide and held up his fist, letting his fingers fall open to reveal a huge pearl in his palm.  He held it out to Levi in offering, too pleased with himself, and Levi took it with a glare.  The urge to throw the thing back into the water was overwhelming, but he held back.

 

Jean would probably try to go after it.  Because he was a fucking idiot.

 

“What good is this if you die getting it, you moron?”

 

Jean’s smile faltered, and he looked at Levi with a frown, eyes falling half closed.  Levi shook his head, setting the pearl down well away from the water’s edge with a sigh.

 

“You’re so damn stupid.  Both of you.”  Eren glanced up, affronted.

 

“Hey, what the hell did I do, I-”

 

His words were cut off when Levi jumped in the water, surfacing beside the pair a few moments later, hair plastered to his face.  Levi was positive Jean didn’t realized he’d wrapped his tentacles possessively around Levi’s legs as soon as he got close enough.  One of Eren’s hands was at Levi’s back, helping keep him aloft, both of them watching as though Levi might bite them.

 

He leaned down and kissed Jean instead, cupping his face with both hands.  There was nothing chaste about it.  All tongue and teeth and bitten lips, and Jean surged out of the water so fast that Levi almost went under in the melee.  Jean had him pressed against the rocks at the pool’s edge in an instant.  Kissing him so hard it was difficult to think, to breathe, to respond.  It was wet, and vicious, and Levi almost didn’t notice the whining noises he was making into Jean’s lips.  Something settled into place within him, loose and tight all at once.   _ Yes, finally _ , it whispered, making Levi go limp and relaxed.  Then cool fingers were easing him back from Jean’s mouth, and when he let reluctantly himself be pulled away Eren was there, whispering against Levi’s cheek.

 

“That’s not fair,” he said, and claimed Levi’s lips with his own.

 

Eren’s kisses were just as demanding, if not quite as full of teeth.  He pressed forward more, like he was trying to climb inside of Levi, to swallow him whole.  Wrapped his arms around Levi, one hand sliding up to fist in his dark hair, tugging his head this way and that.  Rough, and unyielding.  When he managed to pry his lids apart, out of the corner of his eyes, Levi noticed Jean’s tentacles flashing bright with color.  With desire.  Eren’s eyes remained closed, and he growled and huffed out ragged breaths, as though unsatisfied somehow.  His fingers went brutal in Levi’s wet locks, his nails digging into Levi’s back almost painfully.

 

Trying to get closer, deeper,  _ more, more, more. _

 

Jean started painting chaste little kisses across Levi’s jaw, down his throat, laving wetly at the marks there.  His teeth scraped gently over the black designs, and his tentacles were tighter, wetter, pulsing with heat everywhere they touched Levi’s skin.

 

Then Levi felt something nudging into his hip, and he reached down without thinking and palmed Eren’s slick length.  It twitched in his hand, and if Levi didn’t know better he would’ve sworn it was trying to… curl around his fingers, shape itself against his palm.  Eren shuddered hard and broke their kiss, face falling until his forehead rested against Levi’s collarbones.  His mouth kept moving against Levi’s skin, as though trying and failing to find words, unable to do more than gasp.  

 

But a different sound drew Levi’s attention, wheezing and raspy, and both he and Eren’s gazes snapped over to Jean, who seemed oblivious to the noise he was making.  He was still licking his way over Levi’s mark, tasting every inch of it, lost in the heat that was climbing in all of them.  He was above the water, and therefore breathing mostly through his nose and not his gills, but they were ravaged and trying to purge the salt that now lined them.  Levi brought up both of his hands and eased Jean back, trying not to be swayed by the wounded look he got in the process.

 

“Jean, you’re barely breathing, I don’t really think now is the time for this.”  Jean nuzzled back down into Levi’s throat, unconcerned.

 

“You started it.”  The noises he was making grew louder, and even though his mouth felt delicious, Levi pushed him away again.

 

“I’m finishing it, too.  Get in the damn water until your neck doesn’t look like raw meat.”  Eren’s fingers ran over the abused flesh of Jean’s gills, soft and light, watching him cringe at the touch.

 

“He’s right, love.  This can wait.  He’s not gonna change his mind.  Can’t you  _ scent  _ him?”  Jean didn’t look as though he agreed at all, gaze darting from Eren to settle on Levi.

 

“Promise?”  Jean was begging with his eyes, and Levi sighed, fighting the urge to roll his own.  He ran a thumb over Jean’s kiss swollen lips, struggling not to delight in the way those golden eyes fell closed in bliss.

 

“I promise.”

 

He wasn’t exactly sure what he was promising, but knew that he would be happy to keep it anyway.

 

Somewhere in the past few weeks he’d lost himself, become someone new.  Someone who ached in sympathy at the sight of Jean’s salt burned gills.  Someone who went heated and electric when Eren pinned that wanting stare on him.

 

And this new person he’d become... would give them anything.

 

……………………

 

Levi had no idea how long it would take for Jean’s gills to heal, but he’d expected a day or so at the very least.

 

Certainly more than a few hours.

 

The sun had barely started to fade in sky when Eren heaved himself out of the water and beckoned Levi closer with long viridian fingers.  Jean floated just in front of Eren, head resting in his scaly lap, staring wistfully towards Levi as he approached.  His arms were wrapped around Eren’s waist, a couple of his tentacles holding onto the rocky edge on either side of Eren’s tail.  Levi had long since discarded the leather scraps he’d worn when he first fell, electing to cover himself with various furs, but lately he didn’t bother.  They’d seen him naked.  He’d had his hands around Eren’s arousal, knuckles brushing over the wet slit beneath it.

 

Levi was pretty sure one of Jean’s tentacles was not quite like the others, and if that was true then he’d probably fallen asleep at some point with Jean’s cock wrapped around his thigh.  The more Levi thought about it, the more he realized Jean tended to touch him with the same tentacle every time.

 

Fucking pervert.

 

Levi pushed those thoughts aside and sat down next to Eren on the side of the pool, feet dipping into the water up to his calves, waiting expectantly.  He’d kissed them, touched them, made it clear that he was okay with taking things further between them as soon as Jean was healed.  Still, they asked.  Eren reached up with the hand that wasn’t busy petting Jean’s hair and laid his palm over Levi’s cheek.  He leaned into the touch instinctively, a flower drawn to sunlight, waves throwing themselves at the shore.  One of Jean’s tentacles slipped up to stroke absently against Levi’s thigh, and he spread them wider without thought.

 

Jean’s breath caught in his throat, a hand joining his tentacle, fingers digging into the flesh of Levi’s hip.

 

“Do you still want this?”  Levi nodded almost drunkenly, Eren’s hand never leaving his face, watching with rapt attention as the mer continued.  “Once we… come together, once we mate you, you’ll be different.  There’s no going back after that.  Back to your people, or your life, or your humanity.  Are you sure?”

 

Levi wasn’t sure what Eren meant, really.  There was already no going back.  Even if he could climb the falls, his people would just throw him down again.  For someone with a mark, there was no safe haven, not anywhere he knew of.

 

Levi could run for hundreds of miles and there would still be someone waiting to drag him back to the place he was born and toss him over the waterfall’s crest.

 

Even if there was somewhere to go, he did not want to climb the falls.  Didn’t want to run for miles.  Did not want to take even a few steps.

 

Didn’t dare breathe too hard, lest he shake off Eren’s touch, or stop Jean’s hand from sliding up and down his skin.  But Eren needed an answer, and Jean looked like he was holding his breath waiting, so Levi let the words fall out on their own.

 

“There’s nowhere else I want to be.  Even if you’re both idiots.”

 

Jean pressed a smiling kiss to Levi’s knee, and when he pulled away Eren wasted no time.  Levi was tugged into Eren’s lap, and he let himself be arranged facing the mer, Jean pressing against his back.  Levi went loose and pliant and obedient in a way he’d never been in his life.

 

Mostly because he had no desire to protest, no will to resist.

 

_ Do what you want with me, because I want it, too. _

 

Eren kissed him, less urgent than before, but still deep and needful and messy.  Eren’s tongue licked its way between Levi’s lips, spilling over his own, mouths coming together perfectly.  Levi’s hands slid up Eren’s chest, over his throat to sink into his wet russet locks.  Levi tugged at them, fingers threading into the strands, like if he didn’t hold on tight enough Eren might escape somehow.  He heard stuttered whines coming from someone, but Levi wasn’t sure if it was him making them or not.  Levi let out a definite gasp when he felt Eren’s length begin nudging out of the slit beneath him, slippery between his thighs.  He tried to kiss Eren harder, tried to put his desire into words, but it was hard to reciprocate like he wanted to.

 

Which was Jean’s fault, mostly.  Because Jean’s hands were everywhere on Levi’s skin, as though Levi was cold and Jean needed to warm him.  They mapped out every inch of his back, danced across his thighs.  They ran up and down Levi’s arms, over his chest, down to his hips to cling briefly before moving on again.  Then they sought out Levi’s nipples, rubbing gentle circles over them before rolling them between his fingers.  The sound he made was entirely undignified, high pitched and whimpering and Levi didn’t even care, hips starting to rock of their own volition.

 

Not just Jean’s hands, though.  One of his tentacles curled around Levi’s waist, suckers sticking tight against him, wetter than he remembered them.  One circling high on each of Levi’s thighs, close to the juncture of his hips, pulsing and clutching and possessive.

 

Jean began kissing at his shoulders then, sucking at them, sinking his teeth in here and there.  Not hard enough to break the skin, but Levi shuddered in bliss at every bite.  Then he mouthed his way up Levi’s throat, licking at the mark there, murmuring soft praise against Levi’s flesh.

 

_ You’re so perfect, so beautiful, you taste so good.  Gods, Levi… _

 

When one of Eren’s found Levi’s shaft, gripping it tight against the mer’s own and starting to stroke, he could not longer maintain their sloppy kissing.  His head lolled back onto Jean’s shoulder as he rutted forward into Eren’s touch.  Levi was liquid, and shivering, and if the pair had not been holding him up he was sure he wouldn’t have been capable of doing so.  Would melt into the floor, overcome with sensation.  No longer occupied with Levi’s mouth, Eren began laving at the other side of Levi’s throat.  Assaulted from both directions, too much and not enough, and Levi felt broken in a way that made him want to beg for more.

 

One of Jean’s hands fumbled at Eren and Levi’s joined arousals, slipping beneath them, and then Jean’s long fingers were delving into the mer’s dripping slit.  Levi watched, spellbound, as they disappeared into Eren entirely, coming out wet and shining, before easing back in again.  Eren’s hold on their cocks faltered, and he quaked, mouth falling open slightly as Jean fingered him slow and steady.  Levi could feel Eren’s shaft twitching each time Jean pressed in, fluid pulsing out the tip to leak over Eren’s fingers.  The tentacles holding Levi clung harder, digging into his thighs and waist, desperate somehow.

 

After a few moments Jean pulled his hand away, leaning forward over Levi’s shoulder to kiss Eren’s cheek.

 

“I’m sorry.  I’m not teasing.  Just wait.”

 

Eren nodded, still panting from the touch, and started working their cocks again.  Levi was confused even through the lust rising in him, wondering why Jean would start toying with Eren like that only to stop so quickly.

 

Then Jean’s slick covered fingers were between Levi’s cheeks, pressing and circling but not entering him.  Levi  _ keened _ , arching back into Jean’s touch, trying to make his mouth work, because he wanted to beg.  _  Please, please, I need you… _  Eren kissed Levi’s jaw, his cheeks, his nose, while Jean’s mouth pressed close to Levi’s ear, voice almost too low to hear.

 

“Can we?”

 

Levi nodded fiercely, again and again until Jean was chuckling soft against his hair, both pleased and amused.  He wanted to be indignant, but Jean’s finger slid inside him, and he could be nothing but grateful.  _  Fuck, yes, gods, please _ , and it took Eren whispering soft praise to him before Levi figured out he was saying those things aloud.  After a few tentative thrusts Jean worked in a second finger, twisting and scissoring and stretching.  Heat crawled up Levi’s spine to eat him alive, muscles tensing, arousal jerking violently in Eren’s fist, and-

 

“G-gonna come, gonna-”  Eren shushed him, nuzzling into his face, so affectionate that Levi’s chest hurt.

 

“Shhhh, it’s fine, come for us, precious.”

 

_ Precious. _

 

Levi’s whole body shook as he obeyed, shivering out his orgasm over Eren’s fingers, muscles twitching around Jean’s.  It went on and on, vision hazing out in white even behind his lids, and when he finally came down from the high and opened his eyes, Levi’s spent cock jerked at the sight.

 

Eren had lifted his come soaked hand up to his face, and now Jean and he were both licking it clean.  Tongues sliding between fingers to twine together, eyes closed in bliss, eating up Levi’s seed like they were starving for it.  Levi stared, wide eyed and enraptured as they groaned at the taste of him.  Eren turned his hand this way and that, both of them seeking out every bit of fluid, every pearlescent drop shining against the green of his skin.  Once there was nothing left but the wetness of their mouths, Eren let his hand fall and they kissed hard over Levi’s shoulder.  Moaning, Jean biting at Eren’s lips, moisture leaking down their chins.  Jean’s tentacles were moving over Levi then, seeking and curious, caressing him.  Soothing, and stroking, and Levi felt very much like a pet being lavished with attention with one hand while its masters were busy.

 

They caught Levi staring and both grinned, but didn’t pull away from one another just yet.  Jean started working his fingers inside of Levi again, and he gasped at the overstimulation, too much too soon, but then relaxed into it with a sigh.  Didn’t fight the breathy whimpers, or shuddering muscles, or warmth coiling in his guts.  Just watched them love one another as Jean stretched him open, Eren lazily palming at Levi’s cock again, patient and relentless and slow.  

 

More patient than Levi was, evidently, because neither one of them had come yet but they appeared to be in no hurry.  Jean sank a third finger into him,  and Eren ran a thumb over the head of Levi’s arousal, and both of them were entirely too relaxed for Levi’s tastes.  He was already getting hard again, fucking himself desperately back onto Jean’s fingers, biting back the mewling noises that wanted to spill from his mouth.  Thrusting into Eren’s palm, and grasping at their skin, and it wasn’t fair that they were so put together while he was falling apart.

 

So he spent a moment looking down at Jean’s tentacles, seeking out the one he was after, and it wasn’t hard to figure out which of the appendages that was.  The one that was always touching Levi somehow, his legs and his wrists and his stomach, positioned on the front of Jean’s body just off center.  It was curled around Levi’s waist right then, leaking a clear fluid against his skin, swollen compared to the others.  Throbbing.  Levi closed his fist around it and stroked, his other hand reaching under Eren’s cock to bury two fingers in the mer’s warm slit.

 

They split apart from their kiss as though they’d been burned, making twin noises of surprise as Levi stroked Jean and twisted his fingers within Eren.  Jean laid his forehead against the back of Levi’s neck, panting.  Eren fell forward into Levi’s throat, mouth open over his mark, both of them suddenly breathless and overwhelmed.  Levi ground Jean’s fingers deeper into him, deliberately tightening around them, running his own digits around the suckers of Jean’s tentacle.  Eren got wetter around his touch as he curled and scissored, shivery and flushed, and Levi watched as strange patterns danced over the smooth purple flesh of Jean’s lower body.  Then he lifted Jean’s tentacle and brought it up his mouth and licked the clingy suckers underneath it.  The fluid they leaked was salty, but not entirely unpleasant, and he dug his tongue in mercilessly.  Sucked them, and mouthed at them, holding Jean’s gaze as he did so.

 

After a few moments he pulled back, smirking.  He might have been trying to tease them, but Levi was still needy and wanting, unable to keep from stuttering as he spoke.

 

“S-stop teasing and fuck me already.”

 

Jean hissed, and Eren swore, and then it was a rush of motion.  Jean’s fingers slipped free of Levi, and he was roughly spun in Eren’s lap until he was facing the blond.  He cringed, hoping he hadn’t hurt either of them as his hands were tugged free from where he’d been touching them both.  Jean’s tentacles snaked back around Levi’s thighs and forced them obscenely wide, suckers sunk in tight and unyielding.   There was a slight pull as the tips of the appendages spread Levi’s cheeks open even further, and a surge of precome dripped from his crown at the sensation. Eren’s hands held him steady, painting Levis shoulders with bruises and bites.

 

Levi could feel Eren’s arousal moving beneath him, not just twitching or pulsing but  _ seeking, _ as though trying to find Levi’s hole all by itself.  Jean’s eyes were alight with desire, teeth sunk brutally into his lip.  The tentacle Levi had been caressing and licking before was now rubbing at Levi’s entrance, bumping into Eren’s cock in the process, and he couldn’t stop himself from asking.

 

“Who’s first?”

 

Jean smiled, a predator’s grin, and took Levi’s hand in his own as Eren groaned incredibly loud.  He guided Levi’s hand down until it was touching Eren’s length, the heel of his palm on the base of Eren’s shaft, fingertips sinking lower.

 

Lower, to feel where one of Jean’s secondary tentacles was buried in Eren’s slit already, thrusting in and out.  

 

To feel as Jean coiled his slick, swollen appendage around Eren’s cock, pressing he and Jean’s entwined arousals against Levi’s hole.

 

“Everyone’s first, precious.”

 

Jean held their hands in place as he used his grip on Levi’s thighs to pull him down onto Eren’s length.  Levi whined as he was stretched open, sinking deeper and deeper, impaled on them both at once.  Felt them fucking into him, both with his palm and inside.  Eren’s cock  _ writhed  _ in him, Jean’s tentacle moving as well, tightening, coiling, uncoiling.  By the time Eren was fully seated, Levi was calling their names, swearing, mumbling out incoherent nonsense.  Eren wasn’t doing much better, mouthing helplessly against his hair and neck as he rutted up into Levi.  

 

Levi reached back with one arm to cling to Eren, his other holding onto Jean’s shoulder, trying in vain to ground himself.  

 

Then Jean wrapped another of his tentacles around Levi’s cock, and Eren’s fingers were in his mouth, and they were  _ destroying  _ him.

 

Eren managed to find a rhythm even with Jean’s tentacle twisting in and out of his slit, fucking up into Levi with increasing violence.  He hissed out Levi’s name, holding almost too tight to Levi’s waist with his free arm, and kissed everywhere he could reach. Nosed at Levi’s hair, his fingertips massaging at Levi’s tongue.  Levi drooled around them, breathing in on a whine and out on a moan, again and again.  

 

Jean was merciless with the tentacle inside Levi, finding his prostate with the appendage’s tip and rubbing brutal circles on it, both he and Eren leaking slickness until Levi could feel it dripping out of him.  The tentacle curled around Levi’s cock stroked him tighter than any fist could, suckers clinging and releasing, trailing back over the head and making him mindless.  All the while Jean’s arms held him, mouth hungry on his skin, breath hot against Levi’s already burning flesh.

 

Eventually Eren’s fingers dropped from his mouth, Levi lost track of himself as his pleasure surged higher and higher.  Who he was touching, the sounds he was making, all of it rolled back under the waves of euphoria.  He started trembling as he got close to the edge, and Eren went over first, pulsing hot jets of seed into Levi in waves.  Eren hissed into Levi’s ear as he came,  _ you’re so good, you’re ours, you’re perfect.  Gonna take care of you, keep you safe, I love you, _ and it was enough to have Levi arching his spine as he followed suit.  Pearly ropes of come shot out over his abdomen, some of it landing on Jean, making even more of a mess of them both.

 

His eyes stung, and his throat felt strange, and Levi felt bizarre heat creeping over the outside of his thighs.  Something itched in his nose.  His hands went tingly, and his feet went numb, and Levi thought he might be someone new.

 

Levi wasn’t sure he would know when Jean came, but then it happened as he was shuddering out his own climax, and it was unmistakable.  So much slick, all at once, warm and wet and overpowering.  Jean’s tentacle twitched and shivered inside, and he bit down painfully hard on Levi’s shoulder.  

 

When they both carefully pulled out of Levi there was a rush of liquid, and it should have been disgusting, but it wasn’t.

 

It made him feel  _ owned, _ and it was satisfying to some ancient part of Levi he hadn’t known existed.

 

Eren and Jean eased him under the water, and he didn’t gasp, or panic, or worry about air.  Just went limp as they ran their hands over his skin, washing him clean, showering him in kisses as they landed on the pool’s floor.

 

An eyelid he hadn’t possessed before slid closed over his irises, and his nostrils sealed up tight in a way that would have been impossible, keeping out the river’s flow.

 

Gills he’d never used opened up, water rushing through his marks, soothing and cool.

 

They curled up together on the sandy bottom of the pool, Eren pressed in behind him, Jean nestled against his chest.

 

The water slipped by all around them, slow and soft and safe, and Levi went to sleep with a hand buried in his hair, and tentacles coiled around his waist.

 

………………….

 

He woke up beneath the river’s surface, light filtering down ethereal through the water to flit over his skin.  Jean was still coiled up around him, Eren pressed in from the other side.

 

Levi had scales on the outside of his thighs, identical to Eren’s in shape and texture but the same shade of purple as Jean’s tentacles.  His fingers and toes were webbed and clawed as Eren’s were, though he lacked the fins on his ears and arms that the mer possessed.  

 

There was a necklace around his throat that Levi hadn’t been wearing, and he reached up to trace it with his fingers, but he didn’t need to see it to know what it looked like.  

 

Shimmering round stones.  A handful of pearls.  Seashells strung together.

 

He didn’t know when or how they managed to make it, but he knew it would fall to pieces well before he willingly took it off.  When Jean and Eren woke up they took him again, this time lying on the riverbed, praising Levi in a language he shouldn’t understand.  Clicks, and hums, and high pitched whines, but somehow it all came through clear as day.

 

_ So pretty, so tight, so good. _

 

_ Levi, gods, yes. _

 

Once the heat of want fell away they seemed anxious to take Levi out from beneath the falls.

 

_ Gotta show you off to everyone. _

 

_ Can’t wait to see the looks on their faces. _

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



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